As I said, the Chauffage Central didn't marché on December 23, and hadn't marché-d since. The proprietor says he can't get any coal, and this may be true enough, for the Seine has been rising and rising, and a few days ago was higher than at any time since the floods of '08. Great quantities of coal are at Rouen, but the transports can't get under the bridges to bring it to Paris, with the river so high. It seems that almost every one's proprietor was far-seeing enough to get in a huge supply last summer, but ours was probably strolling along some sunny beach and never gave the question a thought. To-day Mme. H---- heard that he has been laying in coal at his residence this last week, and still won't provide for us. The only indemnity he can be made to give is five francs a day per apartment, and it costs about two francs per room a day to keep heated by coal or wood. The five francs pays to keep alive the stove that Madame has had put in the dining-room and for the extra gas she uses in cooking. And where do we come in, we pensionnaires? We buy our own coal or wood or petrol stove, as the case may be, and it's very hard on some of us, particularly Mlle. Germain. And on top of all this, we freeze. I thought at first that it would be lovely to have a darling little fire every night, and I never thought what it would be to get hold of darling little logs and then make them burn. For a week or two it was more or less fun and very war-y, but the drawbacks begin to pall after weeks. You see the fireplace is only nineteen inches wide (I measured it with the little blue tape measure Mother gave me), and the logs I burn are about twelve inches long. So at best the heat penetrates to a maximum distance of five feet. And finally the logs they send me are wet--and you can't get kindling. If you could imagine the amount of time I have spent kneeling in my fur coat before the miniature fireplace trying to light a couple of wet logs with an old copy of the "Herald," you would certainly smile. Here's where the cases from home came in strong. Our good helper Agatha and I split them into kindling and made two bundles and I carried them home. It is typical of the Latin Quarter that no one gave me a second glance as I strode along the street with a big bundle of wood on each shoulder. They burned as nothing ever has burned in my sight before. I told Mrs. Shurtleff that I was going to write next for a case of kindling from America!